Eight of the 10 stores in the Dallas area will be in Wal-Mart lots, Frank Sica, vice president and general manager of
Seattle’s Best, said in an interview. There’s no indoor seating
at the 523 square-feet (49 square meters) shops and customers
order from their cars at the drive-thru or at a walk-up window,
he said.

“Our customer is definitely on the go -- they’re value
conscious and they’re in need of a better cup of coffee,” Sica
said. “We were very strategic in terms of where we placed our
locations.”

Starbucks, which has owned Seattle’s Best since 2003, has
been trying to boost U.S. sales by expanding beyond its
traditional coffee cafes. The Seattle-based company is also
opening new Teavana locations after acquiring the tea seller
last year for about $626 million. Starbucks has said it would
expand Seattle’s Best and revive its retail presence with more
locations.

Seattle’s Best has “forged a very strong relationship with
Wal-Mart,” Sica said. He declined to discuss future expansion
plans and specifics of the contract with the world’s largest
retailer, which is based in Bentonville, Arkansas.

The first of the smaller-sized shops opened in November in
Seattle after the brewer closed about 475 Seattle’s Best stores
that were inside Borders Group Inc. locations following the
bookseller’s bankruptcy filing in 2011.

Dunkin’ Donuts

Four more Seattle’s Best drive-thru stores are slated to
open in the Dallas-Fort Worth area this year. The chain has
about 75 locations, while Starbucks, the world’s largest coffee-shop operator, has more than 11,100 shops in the U.S.

Starbucks rose less than 1 percent to $64.13 on May 17. The
shares have gained 20 percent this year through last week, while
the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has advanced 17 percent.

Dunkin’ Donuts has also recently announced that franchisees
are opening more units in Texas cities including Austin and
Dallas. Dunkin’ Donuts, owned by Canton, Massachusetts-based
Dunkin’ Brands Group Inc. (DNKN), has more than 7,300 domestic
locations.